This report has been prepared in order to assess the environmental performance of the existing desalination plant
for the purpose of registration of the plant according to the requirements of the Environmental Protection Agency.
This report focuses only on the desalination plant and no other operations of the resort are incorporated within the
context of this report.
Environmental Impact Assessment (or Audit) is required for the registration of desalination plant under the
Desalination Regulation of the Maldives. Also, desalination plant projects fall within the list of projects requiring
Environmental Impact Assessment study under the Environmental Impact Assessment Regulation of the Maldives.
However, since the desalination plant in Gangehi (like many other such facilities in the Maldives) has been
operational when the Desalination Regulation and the EIA Regulation came into effect, the scope for this
Environmental Impact Assessment has been based on that of an environmental audit of the existing facilities,
focusing on the environmental compliance and performance of the existing desalination plant.
Therefore, this report will include a compliance and performance audit. The compliance audit or review will
assess how well the project implementation complies with the existing environmental policies or requirements by
the registering authority and the performance audit will assess the actual environmental impacts of the project
and how well the impacts have been mitigated during the construction as well operational phase. The
performance audit will also include a review of the existing monitoring programme, discussing the deficiencies
and suggesting improvements for future monitoring.
There have not been any legal requirements for environmental monitoring as there has not been any EIA report for
the resort facilities under consideration. Therefore, this report is based on the findings of site investigations
carried out by the consultant and necessary information provided by the management and technical staff at
Gangehi resort. However, it is noted that the resort has a system in place to monitor environmental performance
indicators of which water quality tests undertaken in the recent past by the Proponent have been used in
preparing this report.
In addition to discussing the findings of the audit, a matrix will be presented which summarises the status of
environmental compliance and performance for activities involving the operation and maintenance of the facility.
This report will also provide recommendations for further environmental improvements to the desalination plants.